On the Vulnerability of a Strong Poet: Translating Akhmatova’s Female Love In the West, Anna Akhmatova is broadly known as one of the most powerful voices for poetry of witness. If you are a non-Russian-speaking reader and have read any Akhmatova, you probably read her long, epic, narrative poem Requiem, which captures the collective sorrows …
Translation as activism: an updated version of Rubén Darío Raised by an immigrant parent from Nicaragua, my siblings and I spoke Spanish with our mother while growing up. Amongst ourselves we spoke English. Ours, then, was a bilingual home in San Francisco, CA, where we were born. Although my mother’s education did not exceed …
It is 3:30 in the morning here, and the email chime on my phone rings. In Syria, it’s 10:30 a.m. Saleh Razzouk writes, “I am happy you are not on the verge of insanity, the edge of the thing like me. Yesterday I was about to lose my flat because an act of terror hit …
Letter from Beijing 4: Poets from the Yangtze River 北京来信：来自长江/ 汉水的湖北诗人 by Ming Di This week in Beijing’s packed with events. After the final reading yesterday (October 12, 2017), Tracy K. Smith returned to the states. Kevin Young and John Yau along with the Mexican poet Mario Bojórquez went to Wuhan for a 3 day …
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Life and Times — On John Robert Lee’s Collected Poems 1975-2015 By Vladimir Lucien About a month ago, I saw Robert Lee having lunch with a few of his mates. “Old boys”, I thought to myself (which is what his alma mater —also mine— calls their alumni). Something about the collegial, somewhat mischievous laughter, and …
LETTER FROM BEIJING 3: HOW WOULD LI BAI WRITE TODAY? 北京来信3：李白活在今天会怎样写诗？ LIGHT UP By Chen Dongdong 陈东东 Light up an oil lamp in the rocks so they can see the sea. Let them see the sea and the antique fish. See the light too, a lamp held high on the hill. Light …
Letter from Beijing 3: How would Li Bai Write Today? 北京来信3：李白活在今天会怎样写诗？ Read More »
In the River by Carmen Radley Last May, on a warm Friday evening, I stood on the north bank of the Rio Grande. I gazed south and noted that the landscape—from the dust the color of linen that puffed at each footfall to the writhing ridge of mountains blue with distance—was sublime but desiccated, …
Letter from Paris April 2017 from Margo Berdeshevsky DARK DAWN THOUGHTS WITH POETRY FOR SUSTENANCE STILL APRIL A grackle fallen on hard sand. One eye on a hunger, singing off-key in the dark times. Sun, fallen asleep behind its soul, again. No longer the first century of world wars. It is our 21st. Mourners’ tatters …
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In the Belly of Words By Durs Grünbein An Essay in Honor of Aleš Steger A few days ago, I was surprised by a news report. In the article, I read that there is now a »World Stroke Day« (it’s on October 29th). It is observed just like the »World Toilet Day«, just like …
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北京来信 2：北漂诗人和企业家诗人 Letter from Beijing 2: Chinese poets, drifters and entrepreneurs Introduced and translated by Ming Di, a Chinese poet living between Beijing and California, editor of New Cathay –Contemporary Chinese Poetry (Tupelo Press, 2013) March 2017 “Drifters” in Beijing In My Poetry By Qiu Huadong 邱华栋 I want to eat the sunflowers, the insects and air …
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